As you can tell, I continue to add to my 2003 movie list with Pieces of April. What a wonderful, small film and an immediate classic to me. I am a real softie when it comes to Thanksgiving (my favorite holiday) and food/family movies that lay out a large canvas for viewers to draw out images of their own family memories, the dilemmas that beset us all and the love, hope and reconciliation that emerges from the simplicity of breaking... Read more

To End All Wars was released straight to DVD last week. It is a harrowing and inspirational “true” story, based on a book and the experiences of Ernest Gordon, of the 69th Scottish Regiment, who later became the Chaplain of Princeton University, about the World War II prisoner of war story depicted in Bridge Over the River Kwai. I must admit that I began to watch this film with prejudice. The last thing I wanted to see was another movie glorifying... Read more

When Johanna gets fired from her job as the president of a television network, she and her husband Walter, move with their kids to Connecticut. As they take the exit from the parkway to Stepford, we get to see the signs that say “Wrong Way”. You can say that again. The thing about The Stepford Wives is that there are parts that are done well (the whole preamble when Johanna presents the reality show to the affiliates and one of... Read more

Still making up some movies from earlier this year that I missed in theaters. I saw this one on the plane yesterday from LA to Chicago. Someone once told me that every laugh in a film costs a million dollars. If that’s true, then Starsky and Hutch must have been a really low budget movie. OK, I laughed when he shot the donkey and when the car missed the boat (literally). Because it was the airplane version of the film,... Read more

In the third installment of the very exciting and lucrative Harry Potter film franchise, we have a dark fantasy horror film for the adolescents among us – and maybe us as well.  Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban is directed by Alfonso Cuaron (E tu mama tambien; Great Expectations, A Little Princess) since Chris Columbus signed off, and I think he respects the films and the books very much. True, I have only read the first volume and half of... Read more

I Am Not Scared (Io non ho paura) is a film about the time  when a child is transformed from a playmate into a moral being, and awakened to the darkness of adult choices and his own. The beauty is both boys in the story become aware of what it means to try and save someone, and to be saved. To become aware that we are our brother’s keeper. It is 1978 and Michele (mee-kel-lay)lives in a remote and impoverished village... Read more

Thank you for visiting My Movies Journal. Before you look at my film commentaries, I would like to take this opportunity to ask you to visit http://www.nationalfilmretreat.org and consider making a “film retreat”. If you enjoy cinema, spirituality and theology, you’d enjoy this annual gathering. This is our 5th year. The theme is “Matters of Conscience” and the films we are screening are: To Kill a Mockingbird El Crimen de Padre Amaro Pretty Woman Mostly Martha/Whale Rider We have to... Read more

I just saw the DVD of GIRL WITH A PEARL EARRING last night – catching up on some of the fine movies of 2003 (O brother! Where are the really good movies this year???). What an exquisite film. My sister and I both kept saying, “Each scene is a masterpiece – this is a true art film!” Just as Jan Vermeer was a master of composition and light, so is this film, directed by Peter Weber and starring Colin Firth... Read more

TWO BROTHERS is a beautiful tale of twin tiger cubs born in the jungles of Cambodia around World War I. If you liked the 1988 film The Bear by director Jean-Jacques Annaud, you will enjoy this contemplation of nature and the animal kingdom and how harmony can be restored when it is disrupted by human greed. FRom the same studio that brought us Babe… My full review is located here: http://www.americancatholic.org/Messenger/Jun2004/Eye_On_Entertainment.asp#F1 Read more